The Vaccines

It’s frightening how closely the Vaccines resemble the Strokes, though 10 years down the road and across the pond. Both bands are louche and decadent in a way that only trust fund babies can be. Both have been honed to razor sharpness in the guitar-drums-bass departments, but remain slurred and offhand in the vocals. And both, surprisingly, are successful in respective decades way past the heyday of guitar rock bands. Last year, the Vaccines attempted their version of Room on Fire, a more polished but less urgent follow-up to What Did You Expect from the Vaccines? Their Coming of Age hit No. 1 in the U.K. last summer, though critical reception was decidedly mixed. BBC Music found it “fizzing with ideas,” but the Guardian called it “confused and incoherent,” and Pitchfork named it a “a dystopian nightmare.” Whoever you believe, it sounds like a severe case of adolescence. —Jennifer Kelly